


Hanahaki

by Autistic_council_spectre



Series: Waking Dream [2]
Category: Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst with a Happy Ending, Body Horror, F/F, F/M, Hanahaki Disease, Multi, an au of a main fic, who the hell knows, why does everyone keep dying?, ziira is still a mess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-02
Updated: 2018-06-02
Packaged: 2019-05-17 05:29:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14826224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Autistic_council_spectre/pseuds/Autistic_council_spectre
Summary: The Hanahaki Disease is an illness born from one-sided love, where the patient throws up and coughs up flower petals when they suffer from one-sided love. The infection can be removed through surgery, but the feelings disappear along with the petals.





	Hanahaki

**Author's Note:**

> tw for: body horror, some gore and violence+briefly mentioned/implied slavery (ur wonderful Morrowind /sarcasm)

Roses were beautiful in all their variety of colors and sizes. Less so when you coughed and they fell tumbling from your lips speckled with blood. Or when you could feel their thorny stems wrapped around lungs you didn't really need anymore. 

The first time she started coughing up roses they were a pale gold, like the inlay on his robes, like the chain he wore around his neck where the amulet sat. It was fitting in a way, the way they matched up so beautifully like that, gold and red red and gold. Every time he left the room she coughed and choked on the petals she'd been trying so hard to hide from view. 

But she wouldn't tell him she couldn't tell him. He was the Emperor and a human at that it wouldn't be, proper. So she slowly choked on the roses with their petals like spun gold and kept determinedly silent. Even as she could feel the thorns twine further and further through her rib cage, trying to get at her heart and lungs.

Until he caught her in her room, gasping for air with blood on her hands and flower petals on the floor stained the same color as her paws. And he just. Laughed, cried and laughed really as he knelt next to her and wiped the blood from her lips and hands. 

And as he coughed himself, pretty purple flowers like her eyes fuck, she cried too. Because they were so damn stupid they both thought the other would refuse them. 

It wasn't proper by any meaning of the word no, but she didn't care she was in love and everything was okay okay okay. 

Until everything went to hell and back and he was gone and it wasn't fair. It wasn't fair it wasn't! Neither was the fact that instead of coughing up golden petals this time the entire flower came out thorns and all. And she was left with an ache in her soul and an ache in her chest where the rose used to be. 

The second time she coughed up flowers there were so many so many. Lilly of the Valley, Bellsdonna, Angels Trumpet, all falling out of her mouth stained red. This time they constricted tighter and she coughed more often but fuck, fuck it was hard to keep it hidden. So she tried to ignore it and fell into beds on a nightly basis. As if that could make her ignore the flowers curling tighter day after day. 

But she didn't want to acknowledge the flowers growing and burrowing deeper into her rib cage because her soul still ached from before. Even as she could feel her heart quicken each time one of them brushed past or complimented her work. She was doomed.

So she fell into their beds as well, pretending it was just a bit of friendly fun, blowing off steam whatever you wanted to call it. But she didn't stop coughing up the flowers, didn't stop wheezing on missions and almost dying again and again because she couldn’t. Tell them. 

Until Vicente found out when she collapsed in the common room choking and keening in pain. Everything was so dark and she was so tired she didn't even register him picking her up and shouting. Didn't see the panic didn't feel sharp fangs in her neck didn't feel anything. 

Until she woke up and didn't feel the flowers trying to force themselves out of her. They were still there of course but calmer now, more content to lay in her rib cage because they Knew. No one said anything, no one needed to and that was that. 

Except that wasn't that, why did she think she was every going to be allowed to be happy and okay? Sharp claws slid into her Sisters throat and her twin Brothers ribs like she was told to do. And she ignored the blood on her claws the flowers sticking to them because if she ignored them they weren't there and she could pretend they didn't love her back. Even as she gagged and whimpered when the Lilly of the Valley flowers tumbled out she stumbled on determinedly. 

She didn't shake as the knife slide across her Brother and Sires throat, as matching purple Belladonna flowers fell out in a cascade of blood and petals. No there was no shaking and there were no flowers. None none none.

And she didn't curl up on Luciens chest to sob and gasp afterwards. That would be unbecoming and she didn't behave in such a manner. She didn't care anyways she wouldn't Allow herself to care. 

So she went along with what Lucien and the rest of the black hand said and it was okay she was fine. There was a bigger hole where the flower used to nestle but she was. Fine.

Until she was running to Applewatch as fast as she could while she could feel the last flower untwined it's roots from around her lungs. Feel it forcing its way out out out as she collapsed outside. The pale white flower stained red as it sat, judging her, mocking her for not being fast enough not moving as fast as she could and he was dead now. Dead like all the others who's blood was on her hands more truthfully than she would like to acknowledge. 

The third and last time she coughed up flowers she was. Unamused was putting it lightly. The Master came in to her having torn the room to shreds, chairs and tables smashed into splinters on the walls, large gouges in said walls and her attempting to attack him in reflex with a strangled snarl. 

She was tired she was so tired why couldn't she rest and not hurt anyone for once. Wasn't that why she was here? To fucking atone for being bad luck for the others? She was so caught up in her thoughts she hardly felt the whip biting into her back and harshly heard the lecture on destroying her room. She didn't care she didn't care.

What she cared about was protecting him from her, from the bad omens she seemed to carry everywhere with her. So she avoided him as much as possible but he followed gods damn him why did he follow her. Like an overgrown puppy looking for praise and whining when all he got was a kick in response.

So she. Allowed him to follow her but she didn't speak to him unless necessary didn't encourage him. But he still followed, asked her questions, didn't press when she didn't answer, didn't press when he found her coughing up roses. The same color as his scales and the blood looking uncomfortably close to the color of his feathers.

Why was she noticing these things? She wasn't supposed to notice but she did. She noticed the way he tilted his head to the side when he was curious or straining to listen, the way he'd turn more towards someone to hear them better. How his tail flicked and feathers flattened against his skull when he was stressed or nervous. 

And the way he'd come into her room after an episode, like he was approaching a skittish animal with food and water. Helping her put what pieces of her room back together he could and not acknowledging the blood stained roses all over the floor. Helping her wipe down whatever wounds she caused while she clawed at her neck and chest like she was trying to rip them open and get at the flowers. But he never said a word never asked about that.

And then she caught him, on his knees in his room choking on flowers. Roses red as her eyes red as his blood falling from a mouth open in pain to make sickly noises on the floor. Without a word she knelt and brushed the flecks of blood of his lips and throat, made no comment on the flowers, and just. Kissed him. Once twice three times. Until they both stopped coughing and she could feel the flowers settling back into old grooves in her ribs. Making it their home. And she knew he was going to die because of her but she couldn't do anything about it. 

So. When the Master found out and took them to the cliff, made her watch as the sword slid through his stomach and he fell back he fell so far down she knew his body would break on the rocks, she shuddered in pain but she wasn't surprised. Even as she sobbed and whimpered she wasn't surprised.

She waited for the flowers to fall out like all the others and leave her empty. But they stayed. And stayed and stayed and stayed. She almost wanted them to fall out so she wouldn't be left with a mocking reminder a reminder that was only going to cause people harm.

But they stayed, for years and years. Years after the escaped after she killed them all and fled. As her fame and infamy grew in equal measures. The roses lay there nestled in her lungs and ribs. 

Until she was in the sanctuary. The new one, tainted with ghosts but less so than the first one that she choked on a cough. That Veezara looked up at her in concern while she gagged and shuddered. And a rose petal fell out on her bed. 

She blinked at it in confusion. Bewildered and afraid it was finally leaving her, her last reminder until more petals fell out. Not the whole flower no just green petals speckled with red that she bolted from her bed, ignoring Vees concerned yell. Ignoring the fact she was hardly dressed and stumbling stumbling. To the balcony over the common. 

Where the flowers tightened their grip as if to say look! Look! Look who we found! And she looked and she saw. A familiar feather tipped tail flicking in a nervous pattern, green scales like paler emeralds, a face that looked up at her in surprise. A face that had two ruby eyes that replaced the gold and she choked on a cry.

She hardly registered moving, clutching him to her chest as she gasped for air she didn't really need, sinking her claws in his back to prove he was real real real. And it was okay again. Because he was here and he was alive. Gods save her but he was alive and with her. She didn't ask, didn't press to know how, just held him and curled in on herself. Threading her hands through his mane before pressing sharp quick kisses to him that he returned in kind, pressing into wandering paws and hardly remembering where one started and the other began.

He was safe and she was safe. And it didn't hurt so much anymore.

**Author's Note:**

> this is non canon i wrote it when i was feeling #angsty


End file.
